I don’t know about you, but FOR ME, holiday breaks (and April breaks and February breaks and THE SUMMER BREAK) are opportunities for both my best and worst selves to really make a scene.
We don't travel for Christmas or Christmas eve - family is welcome to come to us, but I am not dragging my kids, pets and all their crap only to add to that crap and throw everyone off their schedules, deal with toxic family behaviors, drunken in-laws etc to only have to drag everyone and their stuff back tired and stressed. No thanks. I also am just doing a lot less this year - to the notice of my kids and husband - because frankly I am tired of being responsible for the holiday spirit. I don't have it this year and I'm fine with it. Also, the mountain of packages that contain gifts needing wrapping is getting unruly and I'm seriously considering foregoing wrapping at this point because it's going to take for flippin' ever. Merry Christmahannukahkwanza to all!
I am unromantic about wrapping, I work retail and do enough gift boxes in my day job. When you have women demanding a gift box for a hair clip and wanting a hat/scarf/gloves boxed separately "so they have more to open!!!" the cumulative waste will put you off.
I subscribe to a 'grab bag' philosophy: small items get put in a small shopping bag (when the kids were little it was a reused goody bag with their names on it that was used for everything from Valentine's Day to birthday to Hanukkah), clothing all went in a large shopping bag, keep what you want, don't be fooled by the price on the tag, I paid less ;)
I stopped wrapping a few years ago. Highly recommend. Gifts were presented in the card board box they were shipped in or the brown paper/honeycomb that comes inside the boxes. My kids could care less. I thought about sewing some reusable drawstring bags, but likely won't make it happen until next year.
I am done wrapping. I have wrapped a lot of gifts and I am done. If any other gifts arrive, they can be put in gift bags. If the gift is physically larger than the wrapping paper roll (eg the new scooter) I will put a bow on its head and call it done.
Also, I am giving my kids a lesson on what constitutes an emergency when I am on the phone, asleep, or in the bathroom. Blood or fire and that’s pretty much it. There is no such thing as a “snack emergency.”
My big boundary this year is that I am not doing a holiday card. I am opting out of that particular arms race. I got a few photos of the kids printed for aunts and uncles for whom I know that's the main objective. If you want to know what my kids look like these days, be my actual friend and I'll probably text you a photo at some point.
I resigned from doing our holiday card 2 years ago (after doing it for 16 years), and my husband was totally shocked and upset. I told him if he cared so much he could do it, so he now handles the whole thing...
We have never done holiday cards, but I did get some pics from Walgreens for the family members I knew really wanted a family pic from when we had professional photos done last month. I generally figure if we’re good enough friends you’ll see my pics on social media or you will actually text me and I will send you pictures.
My daughter is in preK at the school where I work in the infant room, so our week off for Christmas is fast approaching. I usually end up suffering from the too little structure problem when it’s just the two of us, so I am going to try to combat that a bit with a loose routine/plans to get out of the house for the days when we are home and my husband is working (the 23rd, 27th-29th). My daughter can now pack her own clothes with guidelines for our brief trip to SC to celebrate with my grandparents and my side of the family so that should be helpful.
I have some tasks I want to get done around the house while I am off of work too, so I am trying to set reasonable expectations of what I can accomplish. I also want to try to finish reading at least two more books before the end of the year because I haven’t been reading novels nearly as much this fall, so I am going to try to make myself take more breaks in being “productive” so that I can read if she’s happily playing independently or watching a movie or something.
I’m inspired by the less email checking. Just set my auto-responder to reflect that too! We aren’t traveling for the winter holidays, really don’t have any totally set plans, and break is long. This year we joined our local Y and I learned about their winter break camps. So I signed our daughter up for 3 different days. This gives us something to “have on the calendar” but doesn’t feel too over scheduled. The days are filled with all kinds of activities and I think it will shake the break up for all of us. This is the first year I’ve ever set up childcare ahead of time for a break and I’m grateful for this new option. Hopefully it goes well for us all!
Thanks for articulating all of these feelings! Honestly, I've been feeling a little Grinch-like about all the WASTE of holiday gifts.
Like the Victoria's Secret body spray my co-worker buys for me EVERY YEAR. Not my taste, gives me migraines, so the plastic goes straight into the trash. (I always half-heartedly try to re-gift or donate it, but...)
I do love all the food traditions and time with the fam, though.
After years of frequent, regular, and long out of state trips to help with my FIL, (which can be tough financially and emotionally, not to mention rough on re-entry), I’ve decided to stay home for the first time ever. I don’t feel 100 percent great about not visiting aging family, but I’ll take the 99 and watch The Bishops Wife and walk with the dog under the pines.
We are a military family and husband’s family lives in one state, mine in another and both of those are states we’ve never lived in since having kids. But we stopped traveling to see family for holidays pretty early on. It’s so stressful and didn’t allow us to create our own holiday traditions. Our winter breaks are now (mostly) relaxing and fun! This year I also said no to my mother when she asked to come visit for Christmas. I love her, and she visits several times a year (even spent all of December last year here) but, for complicated reasons, I felt like I needed to say no and I stuck with it. And I was really proud of myself for setting a boundary.
I was feeling so smug about managing this holiday season really well and then all of us ended up getting sick anyway, one after the other. Touché universe, touché.
I like my sister’s book boundary and I definitely want to prioritize my reading over endless holiday worrying. I’m going to add a Christmas movie boundary. It has come to my attention that I let my kids pick what we are watching like 95% of the time and I told them we are going to watch my favorite-Miracle on 34th St. we have plans the next couple days but it helps to make a loose schedule to make sure it’s not just a 4 hours of screen time free for all while I’m wrapping gifts. I don’t think I can let go of the wrapping.
My oldest kid’s birthday is the last weekend of break so I was trying to get everything planned before break started. It is our last in school day today because we are moving to a new building after break and they wanted a couple days for the teachers to finish their unpacking. So Dec 19-Jan 5 are currently the days I have no childcare lined up. We are going on a Heydary fam beach trip for 5 days after Christmas.
I’m still debating if I can sign them up for little gym camp on that last Thursday and Friday. I missed the window on theater camp and it’s all full- it was significantly cheaper.
We didn’t do much decor this year, literally just had our tree and wreath and I never sent my husband back to the attic to get anything else. I did Christmas cards because we had really nice family pics taken this year but I debate quitting every year.
Because we only did presents for my side primarily it’s not that much to wrap, and I like my plan to watch Hot Frosty while I wrap after Hannah’s in bed on Saturday night.
My new personal holiday boundary is that I am not playing games unless I want to. And I mostly don't want to. It worked at Thanksgiving, but we'll see how hard it is to hold over Christmas.
We call it Forced Family Fun: my husband and I choose a classic movie, usually from the 80s and make our young adult children watch with us. We had to institute a disclaimer that there will probably be naked boobs and politically incorrect language as a given. On the docket this school break: When Harry Met Sally, Rebel Without a Cause, The Sixth Sense for the whole family. For mom/dad/son: the Springsteen doc and Hoosiers (son is a Senior at IU, we showed him Breaking Away before his freshman year and rewatched Animal House as well (originally watched before our daughter's freshman year)). Mom/daughter: Unzipped and The Princess Bride. All family members are welcome for all movies, however.
I love it! We’ve been making our kids watch old movies since they were pretty young and we didn’t realize how great that would be because now they don’t complain when we watch them!
I’m t the other end of the spectrum. My kids are grown and are all getting together for the first time in years in Victoria BC where my son and DIL have three young girls. The other two are non parents however my husband had a heart ablation and has to stay in Florida. He insisted the rest of the family carry on with the plans. I just got up to Victoria and all of a sudden im feeling like I should do it all….decorate, get gifts(because Canadian postal is still striking and I couldn’t mail anything ). and start baking. 😀. But all these comments help
After I had my kids, I put my foot down that we would only be traveling every other year for Christmas. It's worked out well so far, but since my husband and I both have two sets of parents (making four sets of grandparents for the kids) it's still a puzzle to figure out how to see everyone during that time. I think in two years I'm going to gently suggest that we do Christmas with the grandparents either in early December or in January to avoid the calendar madness around actual Christmas.
We don't travel for Christmas or Christmas eve - family is welcome to come to us, but I am not dragging my kids, pets and all their crap only to add to that crap and throw everyone off their schedules, deal with toxic family behaviors, drunken in-laws etc to only have to drag everyone and their stuff back tired and stressed. No thanks. I also am just doing a lot less this year - to the notice of my kids and husband - because frankly I am tired of being responsible for the holiday spirit. I don't have it this year and I'm fine with it. Also, the mountain of packages that contain gifts needing wrapping is getting unruly and I'm seriously considering foregoing wrapping at this point because it's going to take for flippin' ever. Merry Christmahannukahkwanza to all!
LOVE this for you!
I am unromantic about wrapping, I work retail and do enough gift boxes in my day job. When you have women demanding a gift box for a hair clip and wanting a hat/scarf/gloves boxed separately "so they have more to open!!!" the cumulative waste will put you off.
I subscribe to a 'grab bag' philosophy: small items get put in a small shopping bag (when the kids were little it was a reused goody bag with their names on it that was used for everything from Valentine's Day to birthday to Hanukkah), clothing all went in a large shopping bag, keep what you want, don't be fooled by the price on the tag, I paid less ;)
I stopped wrapping a few years ago. Highly recommend. Gifts were presented in the card board box they were shipped in or the brown paper/honeycomb that comes inside the boxes. My kids could care less. I thought about sewing some reusable drawstring bags, but likely won't make it happen until next year.
I am done wrapping. I have wrapped a lot of gifts and I am done. If any other gifts arrive, they can be put in gift bags. If the gift is physically larger than the wrapping paper roll (eg the new scooter) I will put a bow on its head and call it done.
Also, I am giving my kids a lesson on what constitutes an emergency when I am on the phone, asleep, or in the bathroom. Blood or fire and that’s pretty much it. There is no such thing as a “snack emergency.”
I'm taking notes.
My big boundary this year is that I am not doing a holiday card. I am opting out of that particular arms race. I got a few photos of the kids printed for aunts and uncles for whom I know that's the main objective. If you want to know what my kids look like these days, be my actual friend and I'll probably text you a photo at some point.
I resigned from doing our holiday card 2 years ago (after doing it for 16 years), and my husband was totally shocked and upset. I told him if he cared so much he could do it, so he now handles the whole thing...
POWER PLAY
He cared a LOT more than I did about the holiday card tradition!
hell YES
We have never done holiday cards, but I did get some pics from Walgreens for the family members I knew really wanted a family pic from when we had professional photos done last month. I generally figure if we’re good enough friends you’ll see my pics on social media or you will actually text me and I will send you pictures.
My daughter is in preK at the school where I work in the infant room, so our week off for Christmas is fast approaching. I usually end up suffering from the too little structure problem when it’s just the two of us, so I am going to try to combat that a bit with a loose routine/plans to get out of the house for the days when we are home and my husband is working (the 23rd, 27th-29th). My daughter can now pack her own clothes with guidelines for our brief trip to SC to celebrate with my grandparents and my side of the family so that should be helpful.
I have some tasks I want to get done around the house while I am off of work too, so I am trying to set reasonable expectations of what I can accomplish. I also want to try to finish reading at least two more books before the end of the year because I haven’t been reading novels nearly as much this fall, so I am going to try to make myself take more breaks in being “productive” so that I can read if she’s happily playing independently or watching a movie or something.
Love a book boundary!
I’m inspired by the less email checking. Just set my auto-responder to reflect that too! We aren’t traveling for the winter holidays, really don’t have any totally set plans, and break is long. This year we joined our local Y and I learned about their winter break camps. So I signed our daughter up for 3 different days. This gives us something to “have on the calendar” but doesn’t feel too over scheduled. The days are filled with all kinds of activities and I think it will shake the break up for all of us. This is the first year I’ve ever set up childcare ahead of time for a break and I’m grateful for this new option. Hopefully it goes well for us all!
oh that's so exciting - i'm jealous!
Thanks for articulating all of these feelings! Honestly, I've been feeling a little Grinch-like about all the WASTE of holiday gifts.
Like the Victoria's Secret body spray my co-worker buys for me EVERY YEAR. Not my taste, gives me migraines, so the plastic goes straight into the trash. (I always half-heartedly try to re-gift or donate it, but...)
I do love all the food traditions and time with the fam, though.
After years of frequent, regular, and long out of state trips to help with my FIL, (which can be tough financially and emotionally, not to mention rough on re-entry), I’ve decided to stay home for the first time ever. I don’t feel 100 percent great about not visiting aging family, but I’ll take the 99 and watch The Bishops Wife and walk with the dog under the pines.
We are a military family and husband’s family lives in one state, mine in another and both of those are states we’ve never lived in since having kids. But we stopped traveling to see family for holidays pretty early on. It’s so stressful and didn’t allow us to create our own holiday traditions. Our winter breaks are now (mostly) relaxing and fun! This year I also said no to my mother when she asked to come visit for Christmas. I love her, and she visits several times a year (even spent all of December last year here) but, for complicated reasons, I felt like I needed to say no and I stuck with it. And I was really proud of myself for setting a boundary.
I was feeling so smug about managing this holiday season really well and then all of us ended up getting sick anyway, one after the other. Touché universe, touché.
ughhhhhhhh
I try to take my work email off my phone
I like my sister’s book boundary and I definitely want to prioritize my reading over endless holiday worrying. I’m going to add a Christmas movie boundary. It has come to my attention that I let my kids pick what we are watching like 95% of the time and I told them we are going to watch my favorite-Miracle on 34th St. we have plans the next couple days but it helps to make a loose schedule to make sure it’s not just a 4 hours of screen time free for all while I’m wrapping gifts. I don’t think I can let go of the wrapping.
My oldest kid’s birthday is the last weekend of break so I was trying to get everything planned before break started. It is our last in school day today because we are moving to a new building after break and they wanted a couple days for the teachers to finish their unpacking. So Dec 19-Jan 5 are currently the days I have no childcare lined up. We are going on a Heydary fam beach trip for 5 days after Christmas.
I’m still debating if I can sign them up for little gym camp on that last Thursday and Friday. I missed the window on theater camp and it’s all full- it was significantly cheaper.
We didn’t do much decor this year, literally just had our tree and wreath and I never sent my husband back to the attic to get anything else. I did Christmas cards because we had really nice family pics taken this year but I debate quitting every year.
Because we only did presents for my side primarily it’s not that much to wrap, and I like my plan to watch Hot Frosty while I wrap after Hannah’s in bed on Saturday night.
I love Miracle on 34th Street! I’ve been wanting to watch it since Hannah watched The Parent Trap so I was thinking about Maureen O’Hara.
My new personal holiday boundary is that I am not playing games unless I want to. And I mostly don't want to. It worked at Thanksgiving, but we'll see how hard it is to hold over Christmas.
We call it Forced Family Fun: my husband and I choose a classic movie, usually from the 80s and make our young adult children watch with us. We had to institute a disclaimer that there will probably be naked boobs and politically incorrect language as a given. On the docket this school break: When Harry Met Sally, Rebel Without a Cause, The Sixth Sense for the whole family. For mom/dad/son: the Springsteen doc and Hoosiers (son is a Senior at IU, we showed him Breaking Away before his freshman year and rewatched Animal House as well (originally watched before our daughter's freshman year)). Mom/daughter: Unzipped and The Princess Bride. All family members are welcome for all movies, however.
I love it! We’ve been making our kids watch old movies since they were pretty young and we didn’t realize how great that would be because now they don’t complain when we watch them!
I’m t the other end of the spectrum. My kids are grown and are all getting together for the first time in years in Victoria BC where my son and DIL have three young girls. The other two are non parents however my husband had a heart ablation and has to stay in Florida. He insisted the rest of the family carry on with the plans. I just got up to Victoria and all of a sudden im feeling like I should do it all….decorate, get gifts(because Canadian postal is still striking and I couldn’t mail anything ). and start baking. 😀. But all these comments help
After I had my kids, I put my foot down that we would only be traveling every other year for Christmas. It's worked out well so far, but since my husband and I both have two sets of parents (making four sets of grandparents for the kids) it's still a puzzle to figure out how to see everyone during that time. I think in two years I'm going to gently suggest that we do Christmas with the grandparents either in early December or in January to avoid the calendar madness around actual Christmas.